


Nancy

by kuonji



Category: Starsky & Hutch
Genre: Backstory, Character Study, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-11
Updated: 2012-08-11
Packaged: 2017-11-12 00:42:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,672
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/484714
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kuonji/pseuds/kuonji
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>His partner was standing still as stone. His face was blank and silent. He studied Nancy -- not judgmentally, but not approvingly either.</em>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nancy

**Author's Note:**

> Alternative Links:  
> <http://starskyhutch911.livejournal.com/437348.html>

It was a cool Friday night and The Pits was hopping. Huggy was washing mugs at the sink, his long, nimble fingers flying with practiced ease as he and Starsky jawed about giant rats in South America or something. Starsky kept slapping Hutch's back over-excitedly in an apparent attempt to include him in the ridiculous conversation. Hutch felt he was in real danger of getting beer slopped over his wool jacket.

He was just opening his mouth to tell his partner to quit it already!-- when Huggy looked over their shoulders with surprised delight and called out, "Nancy Richardson! What blew _you_ into town?"

Hutch froze at the name. He set down his mug very carefully and turned around, leaning back slightly to see around Starsky's wild curls.

The woman who giggled and held out her hands over the counter to be received by Huggy's wet ones was almost exactly as he remembered her -- full of bounce and girlish flirtation -- though her peach-colored dress and tastefully matched pearl necklace were much finer than he had ever been able to afford.

"Nancy," he said, the name escaping him so softly he was almost surprised when she turned toward him. Seeing her face full on caused a lump to form in his throat. Her wide, brown eyes took him in with the same shock he knew must be on his own face.

"Ken?" she said, after a long moment. "Oh my god, Ken! What are--"

"What are you doing here?" he burst out with at the same time, which pushed them both into a floundering silence.

"She's my cousin's friend," Huggy interjected, hands on hips and a bemused frown creasing his thin face. "I ain't seen her for almost a year. How do _you_ know each other?"

Starsky said nothing, but Hutch was hyper-aware of his partner's presence, exuding curiosity. His and Huggy's open gazes seemed to burn into him.

"Nancy's my... She..." He met her eyes, seeking guidance, and was relieved when she shrugged slightly and smiled. The knot in his chest released all at once, and he smiled back for the first time. "We were married, once." It felt good to say it.

"Married!" Huggy looked him over critically, as if wondering if he were joking.

"It's true," Nancy put in, drawing the attention of the lanky man.

Taking the opportunity, Hutch steeled himself and turned to check Starsky's reaction.

His partner was standing still as stone. His face was blank and silent. He studied Nancy -- not judgmentally, but not approvingly either. A considering look crept slowly up his face, tightening his lips and pinching a slight frown into his forehead -- and then it was suddenly dashed away by a quirk of a smile.

"Ms. Richardson," he greeted, all charm and faux-formality. He took her small but heavy-boned hand in his and kissed the back of it. Deliberately? "David Starsky. Pleased to meet ya," he drawled, turning up what Hutch mentally called Starsky's 'little-boy' grin, the one he used on old ladies and on family.

Hutch thought that was a good sign. Probably.

"It's _Mrs_ , actually," she replied. "But just Nancy is fine. You're a friend of Ken's?"

"Yup. I've heard a lot about you." He shot a quick, telling glance at Hutch, immediately followed by a reassuring one for Nancy. "Only good things, I promise."

Hutch cleared his throat, driven to talk, yet suddenly shy. "Starsky's my partner," he declared. It was weird saying it to someone who had once been so much a part of his life. He felt like she should already know.

Nancy looked puzzled for only a moment. Then her expression cleared and she let out a squeal of excitement. "You're a cop?!"

Hutch nodded, aware of Huggy's wince. Her voice must have carried over half the bar. Most of Huggy's regular patrons knew what the blond and the brunet who visited so often did for a living, but knowing and having it broadcast were not the same. Nevertheless, Hutch felt pride well up at the admiring look on Nancy's face.

"Oh, Bubbles! I knew you could do it!" She hugged him around the waist, and he automatically picked her up and swung her around like he'd used to. Both of them, he realized, seemed finally at ease with each other. "Too bad you're off duty," she said when he set her down again, pouting prettily. "I would've liked to see you in uniform."

Hutch shook his head, feeling his face go red. "I'm a detective. Plain-clothes." He took out his wallet and showed her the badge.

"It's so wonderful." Nancy touched the badge with a reverent expression, and her manicured fingernails reflected the light. Hutch remembered how he'd loved her natural fingernails, pink against her dark skin, as if she always had the perfect shade of nail polish on. She looked up. "I should buy you a drink, to make up for the graduation and the promotion that I missed." She included Starsky with a look. "You and your partner both."

"You're the guest in Bay City. Let me buy you one."  
"Oh, I can't," she demurred. One hand went to her abdomen, and Hutch couldn't help a soft gasp. He couldn't believe he'd missed the soft swell for what it was.

"Oh," he said. "Congratulations." It sounded lackluster even to himself. She bit her lip, looking guilty, which in turn made him feel like a heel.

"Six months along now. Our third," she said.

"That's-- That's great, Nancy. I hope-- I mean, you're... I mean, I'm really happy for you. The, uh, the two of you, of course. I'm so glad. I am." By the time he'd struggled to the end of the sentence, he thought maybe he really was.

"Thank you, Ken." She touched his hand. "I'm sorry."

"You always wanted a big family." Nancy had two brothers and three sisters. Hutch had once declared in mock horror that half that number was enough for him, and Nancy had countered that he'd change his mind once they got started. That was back when they were both sure of having forever together. "Do you think you'll get--" he faltered with the name "--Donald to have another one after this?"

Nancy's eyes flickered. "Don only wanted two. This one was an accident." She put both hands over the slight bulge, protective. The somber look fled, however, replaced by a small, indulgent smile. "But he loves her already."

"Her?"

Nancy made a dismissive gesture. "Oh, I don't know. He had some fancy doctors check with all sorts of machines and they think it's a girl. Don was so excited, he's got a chest full of lacy baby dresses and princess shirts already. Heaven knows what we'll do if we actually have another boy. He'd just have to wear pink, I guess."

Hutch laughed. He thought it sounded a little forced, but Nancy followed up with quick enthusiasm.

"Momma's convinced it'll be another boy, of course. She always has to be contrary. She says something about how I'm carrying, there's no way it's a girl. You should hear how she and Don's mom argue when they're both over for dinner--"

She ended the sentence awkwardly, no doubt at the pained look he was failing to hide. Undercover officer, indeed. He wanted to apologize for ruining the mood but knew it would only accentuate the awkwardness of the moment. "It-- That sounds great, Nance. Don's a lucky man."

"That's just what Lucy always tells me," Huggy cut in, startling both Hutch and Nancy. They'd both forgotten their surroundings for a moment, it seemed. Huggy shot Hutch a quick look before continuing, "Why, Lucy tells me all the time how jealous she is of you two and your kids."

"I bet you and Nancy have a lot to catch up on," Starsky added, nodding politely at the woman. "Hutch and I should probably get goin' anyway. Early day tomorrow."

Gratefully, Hutch seized the exit provided. "Yeah, you're right." He smiled at Nancy, hoping he looked natural. "Our captain's amazing, but he'll tan our hides if we're late again this week." He hesitated, still loathe to part too haphazardly. "If you want to find me again--"

"I'll ask Huggy," Nancy finished quickly.

Hutch swallowed back what he'd been about to say. She had always been the practical one. "Yeah," he agreed. "Huggy's the man, all right." Impulsively, he leaned forward and kissed her on the cheek. She had the barest touch of perfume on. Lavender, her favorite scent in the winter. "It was great seeing you again."

"You, too. Goodbye, Ken." She kissed him back.

He turned back at the doorway and memorized her in peach and pearls, slim with wide shoulders and hips, a sad smile on her beautiful face and the glow of a new life inside her.

Back in the Torino, he settled tensely and waited for Starsky to say something. He looked down at his lap as Starsky started the ignition and edged out of their parking space. Unconsciously, he'd laid his hands palms up like he was meditating, or making an offering, or attempting to read his own future.

It took longer than he thought. It wasn't until they were close to his apartment that Starsky said, "You didn't think I'd understand."

There was a remarkable lack of accusation in that statement. Hutch relaxed halfway with that alone.

"I was afraid you wouldn't. I couldn't take that chance."

"I liked her."

"As some girl in a bar? or Huggy's friend? or as my wife?" he challenged.

"Any one, I guess. I'll be straight with you, Hutch. It knocked me for a loop. But she was... I could see you with her."

"Yeah?" A wash of pleasure and pride went through him.

"Yeah." He paused to make the turn towards Hutch's street. "So what happened? Was it your folks?"

"No. Well, yes. It was lots of things, really. And yeah, none of our folks was happy with it."

His parents hadn't so much rejected Nancy as they had simply pretended she did not exist. For the twenty months they'd been married, his parents had sent him (singular) a card and a gift for every holiday and invited him (again, singular) to several occasions at home. They'd given the air of waiting for him to come to his senses. And he supposed, in their minds, he finally had when he and Nancy were divorced.

Nancy's parents had been no better. They'd projected concern for their 'baby girl' at every opportunity, and every time she visited -- with or without Hutch -- there was a conveniently single, attractive man of appropriate race and occupation 'over for dinner' or 'in town for the weekend' or 'just visiting'. In fact, Donald Richardson had been one of those, Hutch was pretty sure.

"My mom and dad didn't like her for, oh, the obvious reasons, I guess. And Nancy's parents were big activists in the civil rights movement. They couldn't feel safe with handing their daughter over to a white, blond, blue-eyed criminal law student, no matter what we said. I never even dared to tell them I wanted to become a cop." He knuckled his forehead. "Nancy was the only one who believed in me. She told me to go for it. But I couldn't." He sighed and admitted softly, "Not while married to her." He closed his eyes. He'd never told anyone that before, though he feared that Nancy had guessed.

Starsky parked the Torino in front of Venice Place. The homey smells of Helene's wafted in, bringing memories that made Hutch smile. "I met her at a diner. She was a waitress there, part-time. I ate there twice every day for two weeks before I got up the nerve to ask her out." He didn't remember the exact look of the diner anymore, but he did remember the nauseating feeling of the scent of too-familiar foods combined with nearly debilitating nervousness -- and the sense of surreal relief mixed with panic when she'd said yes.

His smile fell. That was how people like his parents saw Nancy -- a Negro waitress. It didn't matter that she had made top grades in school. Didn't matter that she was generous, funny, thoughtful, sensible, and filled with exuberant joy at the smallest things, and righteous anger at others.

"You said you divorced after a miscarriage." Starsky's tone made it not quite a question. Hutch was grateful to him for not doubting what Hutch had told him before, merely confirming.

"Three months. We hadn't even started telling people about it. Nancy was so afraid that--" He stopped, wondering if this was too personal. But one look at Starsky's open expression decided him. "She was already under a lot of pressure. Getting pregnant did something to her. Suddenly, she was depressed all the time. She started worrying obsessively about what people would say when they saw the baby. People would ask questions, of course. And it'd be so much worse for her, because she would be at home all day. When we lost it... She said it was maybe a sign."

He took a deep, shaky breath. He remembered being so _angry_ with her. How could she think that God didn't want them to have a child. That He didn't want them to be together? How could she?

How could he?

"I didn't fight hard enough for her," he confessed suddenly. His deepest, darkest, most shameful secret. Worse even than the heroin. At least that hadn't been by his choice. "I-- I let her go. It was easier. My parents-- And my coworkers were-- We'd go out together, and people kept _staring_ , as if a husband and wife holding hands was some big deal!" He banged a fist on the side of the car door. He knew he was more angry at himself than at any of the curious or even disdainful onlookers he had blamed back then. They shouldn't have mattered. They _shouldn't_ have, so why had they? "It was so hard. I couldn't stand it anymore."

Starsky's hand squeezed his shoulder, and Hutch found the strength for another breath.

"I took the coward's way out. She asked for the divorce, and I didn't argue. I let her be the bad guy." He gazed out the window, unable to bear the claustrophobic sense of being pitied. But he finished it: "She married Donald a couple of months later. She never even cashed my first alimony check."

A hand touched his head and carded fingers through his hair. Not turning around, he leaned shamelessly into that comforting touch, as natural as breathing. He wondered briefly what a casual passerby might make of it.

It'd been a long time since he'd thought about how unusual it was for two men to act this way.

He and Starsky, he reflected... their relationship wasn't exactly by the book either, was it? They were polar opposites in some respects, and like a single person split into two bodies in others. They were as close as lovers in their own way -- and certainly some had derided them for just that. The only response he had for those people nowadays was pity, along with a sense of pride that he had something that other people longed for yet glimpsed so rarely that they couldn't even understand it when it was in front of them.

Nancy had well and truly taught him to stop caring about what others thought. If you did, you might lose something infinitely precious.

"Starsky..." He cleared his throat and faced his partner. "Starsky, you know I love you."

He waited for Starsky to wince at the soapiness and maybe crack some joke. But instead, Starsky simply nodded, matter-of-factly, and replied, "Me too, Hutch."

He felt suddenly light-headed and euphoric, as if the two beers he'd drunk had been two dozen.

Then Starsky grinned and his look turned musing. "So... 'Bubbles', huh?"

He groaned and put his face in his hands -- but behind his fingers, he was smiling fit to burst.

  
END.

**Author's Note:**

> I was thinking about what to title this story, and finally I realized that just the name "Nancy" would be perfect, since this story is all about preconceptions.  Do I think that the 'real' Nancy -- if she wasn't Vanessa -- was Black?  No, not really, but then again.  Why not? ;)
> 
> Here's something that boggled me: "Loving v. Virginia, 388 U.S. 1 (1967), was a landmark civil rights case in which the United States Supreme Court, by a 9-0 vote, declared Virginia's anti-miscegenation statute, the "Racial Integrity Act of 1924", unconstitutional, thereby overturning Pace v. Alabama (1883) and ending all race-based legal restrictions on marriage in the United States." (from <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loving_v._Virginia>)
> 
> 1967???  Which means that a mixed race couple would have been legal in all fifty states for only the last forty-three years!
> 
> By the way, according to the following map on Wikipedia, Minnesota never passed any laws banning mixed race marriage.  Neither did Wisconsin, which is the closest neighboring state to Duluth, where presumably Hutch grew up: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:US_miscegenation.svg>
> 
> * * *
> 
>   
> If you enjoyed this story, you might try these:    
>      [A New Life](http://community.livejournal.com/starskyhutch911/310155.html) (Starsky & Hutch), by kuonji    
>      [Working Women](http://community.livejournal.com/starskyhutch911/358397.html) (Starsky & Hutch), by kuonji    
>      [The Kennedy Deferrment](http://community.livejournal.com/starskyhutch911/398674.html) (Starsky & Hutch), by Puss  
>      [A Voice From The Past](http://community.livejournal.com/meandthee_wish/21689.html) (Starsky & Hutch), by Sparkle     
>  


End file.
